Nicole Ari Parker talks wellness and success

Nicole Ari Parker knows that there’s a lot that goes into being a success, and she’s sharing that knowledge with the women of Spelman College today!

The actress is taking part in the 9th Annual Spelman College Leadership and Women of Color Conference, where she’ll be speaking on why it’s important to be healthy if you want to be a good leader.

“It’s absolutely all connected. Even though it takes us a minute to realize that,” Nicole told S2S. “It should be part of the whole vision for your life–your health and wellness. Just from the physcial standpoint alone, when you feel better you perform better. That’s just basic health math.”

As she sees it, being healthy no matter your size goes a long way to aiding your mental and problem solving abilities because you’ll have a clear head. “Working out isn’t just for your body it’s for your mind as well,” she said.

Nicole would know something about wellness and success as she lauched her Save Your Do! Gym Wrap line last year. The scarf helps women of color maintain their hair while working out. In many ways, Nicole felt that many Black women were opting not to hit the gym because they didn’t want to sweat out their hair, which ultimately put their health at risk for the sake of beauty.

Nicole’s product gives women the option of getting in shape while keeping their hair in check. From it’s humble beginnings in her kitchen, this was one idea that Nicole was determined to bring to the masses.

“I wasn’t really an entrepenuer. I mean I’ve had great ideas before, but I always–just like anyone else–talked myself out of them,” Nicole recalled. “But I just for some reason had the courage to make this happen. We really all needed some help in this department.”

As someone who just started her own business, there’s one thing that the “Soul Food” star wants everyone to remember when striking out to create something for themselves.

“How easy it is to try. When you have an idea, you’ve just to try,” said Nicole, adding that people come up with all kinds of reasons why their idea won’t work before giving it a fair shot. “We talk ourselves out before we write the first sentence. I wish would have know that it’s okay to try.”

She continued, “If everything is aligned spritually and everything is coming from the place, then If you take one step, you know God takes two.”

It may come as a surprise to some that Nicole still had to grind to get her Save Your Do venture off the ground. Just because she’s famous, that didn’t mean that she necessarily had an easier time creating and marketing the product because she was very new to field.

“It was hard it was very difficult to raise money and go around and pitch my product. I started at the bottom,” said Nicole. Shee managed not to be overwhelmed by the enormity of her new business by simply focusing on the small tasks as they came. “There were no favors. But what happened was that everything I needed showed up. I wasn’t afraid to ask questions, I got a great business partner. It was just one step after the other and I had the patience.”